Yu Dongyue (; Hanyu Pinyin: Yù Dōngyuè) was born in Liuyang, a city in Hunan province of China on December 4, 1967. He is the former arts editor of Liuyang Daily. In the Tiananmen protests of 1989, following a plan made by his friend Yu Zhijian, he and Lu Decheng threw eggshells full of paint at a portrait of China’s political figure Mao Zedong. Yu Dongyue was given a 20-year prison sentence for "sabotage" and "counter-revolutionary propaganda”. He had become badly disturbed psychologically. He was also criticized for his "very avant-garde views on art." He also had been subjected to various physical tortures because of “reactionary statements” he and his friends made about officials.
Early life
Yu Dongyue graduated at age seventeen from Xiangtan Normal College, the same college that Yu Zhijian attended. He got a prestigious first assignment as a fine-arts teacher at a vocational school in Xiangtan city that recruited students nationwide, then was transferred to the propaganda job in Liuyang. In the summer of 1987, an official known as Tanxu introduced Yu Zhijian to him. Yu Dongyue had been transferred to Liuyang to serve as an arts editor, his job consisted of taking photographs and draw illustrations to accompany stories in the paper. Yu Zhijian and Lu Decheng were close friends from a young age, later, the three young men became friends. Yu Dongyue was cerebral like Yu Zhijian, but he also shared Decheng’s physical prowess. He was an excellent basketball player and preferred to have an early-morning swim, even on winter mornings when the ice had formed at the river’s edge in Liuyang. In 1989, Yu Dongyue was a twenty-one-year-old arts editor at the Liuyang Daily.
Trip to Beijing
The three friends have the similar interest of reading the literature. They had the ordinary life until Hu Yaobang died on April 15, their enthusiasm for literature rose instantly. They believed that all the corruption, the nepotism, and the stagnated political reform in 1980s Chinese society were deeply rooted in the Chinese governmental dictatorship. Hu Yaobang was also from Liuyang, Yu Dongyue and his friends discussed that they need to engage in memorial for Hu Yaobang as one of their notable countrymen. In the later days, they talk a lot about what happened in Beijing and national politics. Whether the Chinese people have democracy and the governmental conflicts. On May 16, after a whole night of discussion about national affairs, three young men and Li Hongwu, the best friend of Lu Decheng decided to go to Beijing.
In the preparation to travel to Beijing, Yu Dongyue put his notebook, a writing pad and pens, and a camera that belonged to his work unit into a yellow backpack. Before they departed on May 17, in the square of the train station, Yu Dongyue laid out his materials on a long counter. Using black ink on white poster boards, he wrote: “End one-party dictatorship and build up democratic China." On a 5-meter length of red silk, using yellow paint-paint manufactured for use on metal, to give his calligraphy a sheen. He wrote four characters that meant “Down with Deng, Support Fang,” and then the group’s name: "The Hunan Student Movement Support Group, Liuyang Branch. Yu Dongyue and his friends made speeches at the Changsha railway station and solicited donations for their trip.
Role in Tiananmen Square protests
Yu Dongyue, Yu Zhijian, Lu Decheng and Li Hongwu were on board a train that arrived in Beijing on May 18. Later that night, the four recognized the determined voice of Wuer Kaixi. After the four had a discussion with Wuer Kaixi about Mao, Zhijian was brimming with enthusiasm to write a new speech due to he impressed with Wuer’s ability to connect the historical and the present. He and Dongyue wrote a draft of a speech.
In the next day, the four tied red cloths around their foreheads to show they were in solidarity with the students. Yu Dongyue was the one who helped turn Yu Zhijian’s ideas into speeches and into the proclamation delivered to the monument, but the radio station didn’t report it. Yu Dongyue was disappointed about this situation and tried to find a resolution to against the authorities and the ignorance of students. Then Yu Zhijian proposed to tarnish the portrait of Mao in order to symbolically terminate the Communist tyranny, Yu Dongyue and Lu Decheng agreed.